


when i fall you offer me a softer place to land

by bobina



Category: Supergirl (TV 2015)
Genre: Canon Divergence, F/F, Hurt/Comfort, POV Multiple, Solar Flare, SuperCatSummer2019, Unabashed Flirting, canon-typical mayhem
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-01
Updated: 2019-08-01
Packaged: 2020-07-23 22:42:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,048
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20015965
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bobina/pseuds/bobina
Summary: The sky falls on National City and Supergirl answers the call. It's what she does. But who does she turn to in the aftermath?From the prompt: "Cat being tender when caring for small injuries Kara gets when she blows out her powers."Set post-season 1.





	when i fall you offer me a softer place to land

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thetemptationisstrong](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thetemptationisstrong/gifts).



> I had fun writing this one and getting to play around with POV a bit. Dunno if it fits the prompt exactly, but it flowed better than anything I've written in a long time, so I'm going to take it as a win. Let me know what you think in the comments!  
> Title from the song "Push" by Sarah McLachlan.

* * *

when i fall you offer me a softer place to land

The headlines go something like this:

_Superman off-world, leaves Metropolis in care of mysterious Supernova_

_Airline merger blocked amid antitrust fears_

_House passes healthcare bill 339-96_

_National City Nighthawks to face off against rival Monarchs_

That last one is all anyone is talking about. The two teams have had a friendly, somewhat one-sided rivalry for years, but the National City team has a new coach, a new strategy, and something to prove. After a tweet from the CatCo official account, fans have started calling the match-up the Super Series.

Buried underneath the front-page news, sports, business, beneath the fold on page three of the science section, is this headline:

_Meteor shower expected June 15 th and 16th: Large debris possible_

The article itself is insubstantial, just a couple of paragraphs detailing where the view of the shower is expected to be best, and when. It’s mostly ignored, a footnote to the fact that it falls on the same night as the final game of the Super Series.

***

“Guess who has two thumbs and tickets to game seven of the Super Series?!” Winn doesn’t wait for a response, just waggles his phone in Kara’s face until she grimaces and leans away from him.

Alex rolls her eyes and sets down her coffee. “Winn, that game has been sold out for days. Are you sure you didn’t get scammed?”

“You know I’m making an appearance at the game, right? You wouldn’t have a seat, necessarily, but I can get you into the stadium.” Kara tries not to smirk at Winn’s appalled expression.

Winn’s energy is about ten steps above the rest of the floor, but he deflates at the sisters’ teasing. It’s quiet in the DEO. The only sounds are the hum of the computer servers and screens and the quiet clacking of keyboards where a handful of agents are scattered throughout the main floor. Most of them aren’t doing much more than catching up on paperwork.

“It’s _not_ a scam,” Winn insists, and Alex and Kara exchange a look. His mouth scrunches and his eyebrows jump to his hairline. “You’ll see.” He turns to leave, bumping into the console with his hip.

“Ow. Anyway, um, _some_ of us have work to do that doesn’t involve ‘ _making appearances_ ’ so. I’m just gonna go do some very… important… stuff. Now.” He moves across center command, hand rubbing at his hip, and flounces down in his chair.

Alex turns to Kara, coffee abandoned. “Well.” She can’t keep the laugh out of her voice. “What time’s the game?”

***

It is a scam in the end, but Alex gets Winn into the game as part of a plain-clothes security detail just so he’ll shut up about it.

***

June fifteenth dawns with a soft sea mist blanketing the western half of National City. The wind is calm in that way Kara loves, when she can just drift under her own power, listening to her city waking up. It’s a quiet day. She watches the early risers running in the park and the deliveries made to grocery stores and coffee shops before heading home.

She lands softly on her windowsill, smiling to herself as she takes one last look at the sun rising between the clouds, and then pushes the window open and drops into her apartment.

She showers, changes into a soft t-shirt and grey leggings, turns on the news while she makes herself breakfast. She keeps her phone nearby, just in case. Between Supergirl duties and working for Cat Grant, she never really gets a day off, but this is a Saturday morning when she feels like she has the whole world to herself.

“ _Supergirl was spotted this morning flying over Otto Binder Bridge. Gary, any traffic to report out there?”_

Kara hasn’t looked in a while, but she’s pretty certain the CatCo reporters are required to mention Supergirl at least once a broadcast.

_“It’s quiet now, Mark, but I’m sure that’ll change the closer we get to game time tonight. As you can see from the live footage from the CatCopter, there’s not much to report, just a few cars making their way across the bridge towards downtown.”_

Kara plates her eggs and sips at her coffee.

_“Alright, thanks Gary. Gwendolyn, how’s our weather looking?”_

_“Well, Mark, the marine layer is hanging on for now—watch out for patchy fog close to the bay—but that should clear up by this afternoon. Models are predicting a warm day, peak temperatures hitting the upper 70s near the coast to mid-80s inland and downtown. We’ll see some lingering high clouds for most of the day and into the evening, but no rain in the forecast for the game tonight.”_

Cat hates slow news days, hates the repetition of traffic, weather, feel-good human interest puff pieces, but Kara loves mornings like this. Mornings where she knows her city is safe and she can take her time taking care of herself.

She finishes breakfast and does her dishes and goes to switch the television off when the weather report pops up again. Gwendolyn seems to adlib a little bit this time and Kara wonders if maybe Cat herself prodded the producers to spice it up a little for the early morning viewers.

“ _The forecast is still good for the game tonight, but don’t expect much of a view of that, uh, meteor shower late tonight. Those high clouds are going to persist until morning, and we might even see some rain tomorrow! Here’s your full weekend forecast.”_

“You didn’t say anything about rain tomorrow ten minutes ago, Gwen,” Kara scoffs and presses the power button on the remote. The sounds of the city filter up from the street without the noise of the television blocking it out and Kara hums contentedly. She looks around the living room, picking up the blanket on the couch and refolding it. She’ll do a little tidying, sweep the floor, do some laundry, and then she’ll get ready for the game.

***

The stadium is already nearing capacity when Kara arrives, half an hour before the first pitch. The first section of fans to spot her arrival keep their reactions contained, just soft gasps and murmurs to each other, like they’re in on a secret with her. Then the first group of kids sees her, jumping and squealing and pointing and before she knows it, Kara’s image is being projected on the JumboTron and the whole stadium is cheering. She barely hears the agents chattering in her earpiece about her arrival over the din.

The infield dirt is softer than Kara expects and her boots slide a little when she takes her first steps after landing. Camera flashes blink out of rhythm as more and more people realize she’s there. Cyndi Herrera from CatCo’s sports affiliate is waiting for her just past home plate, mic outstretched.

“Supergirl, so glad you could join us tonight!” Cyndi’s voice echoes in the stadium’s PA system and the crowd goes wild. Kara smiles for the cameras, recognizes CatCo’s sports photographer, Lance Ng, in the press pool. She makes sure to angle herself his way, already imagining Cat’s gloating about him getting the best shots on Monday.

“Glad to be here, Cyndi!”

Her earpiece crackles and then Alex’s voice comes through, clear as day, dripping with sarcasm. “ _Jeez, lay it on a little thicker, why don’t you.”_

Kara tries not to let her smile falter. Cyndi’s saying something about the rivalry, how the teams have been neck-in-neck all series, and asks Kara if she has any predictions about the final. Kara isn’t a baseball fan, couldn’t care less about the series except that now it’s named after her and her cousin, so she says the only thing that comes to mind.

“Oh, you know I’m rooting for our ‘Hawks! Come on, they have to win it!” The crowd goes wild again.

Cyndi laughs, fake but professional. “Alright! And are you throwing out the first pitch tonight?” They both know she isn’t, but the crowd eats it up.

Kara spares a glance up at the seats, leans in to speak directly into the microphone when she responds. “Ha ha no, I think I want our catcher to keep his arm!” She gets equal parts cheers and boos from the fans and takes that as her cue. Floating up a few feet off the ground, she poses for the now-staccato flashing cameras and then flies up to hover just above the stadium.

“ _How fast_ can _you throw a baseball?”_

She pauses at Winn’s question, nearly colliding with a seagull. Light flashes, bright and sudden through the clouds off in the distance, and Kara isn’t sure if it’s real or if her eyes are still seeing spots from the camera flashes.

“ _Ka—ah, Supergirl, you there?”_

“What? Oh, um. I dunno.” She watches the sky out over the desert beyond the stadium but doesn’t see anything beyond the clouds and a few distant birds. “How fast do you _think_ I can throw a baseball?”

She listens to Winn verbally trip over himself trying to calculate an answer until Alex, thankfully, cuts him off just as he’s rambling about tests and the Mythbusters and whether or not the impact of Kara throwing a baseball into a concrete wall would destroy the ball or the concrete first.

She stays until the first pitch is thrown, waving to kids in the stands, drifting away towards downtown once the first inning is in full swing.

***

The sunset brings with it a thick humidity and bands of orange light between the high rises. Cat squints into the light from her perch on her office balcony. Hoping against ridiculous hope that her hunch is right, she tries in vain to ignore the heat. It’s been a slow news day, the Super Series really the only thing drawing any attention. It makes Cat feel restless and like she’s missing something. So she waits in the heavy evening air, even as she has to shake her head at herself.

Finally, a smile breaks across her face when she sees a dark speck in the distance heading her way. She half-expected Supergirl to stay and watch the game—or maybe not so much expected as hoped, given the early projections in CatCo’s ratings after her appearance earlier. Cat had half a mind to go to the game herself, shock the stadium brass and actually use the box she purchases at the beginning of each season. But that hunch niggled at the back of her brain that she was right where she needed to be.

Cat swirls the drink in her hand, ice long-melted, and the motion seems to pull the superhero closer like a magnet.

No matter how many times she’s seen Supergirl over the past year, the sight of her flying with her red cape and golden hair fluttering in the wind, that crest across her chest, never fails to take Cat’s breath away.

Supergirl slows to a stop, hovering in the air just above the balcony, one leg bent at the knee and her hands in fists at her sides as if she’ll take off again in an instant. She moves just so, a hair to the left, blocking the sunlight and Cat sighs in relief, her whole face relaxing. Supergirl smiles and… there she is.

Kara.

Some days Cat chastises herself for not seeing it all along. Other days, she thinks she has.

She steps forward, away from the sofa she’d been leaning on. “Well, Supergirl, this is a surprise.” Kara’s face is in shadow, the sunset burnishing her golden hair like a halo, but Cat is fairly certain she catches a blush pinking her cheeks. She files that information away and quirks an eyebrow. “Not a baseball fan?”

Kara can’t hide a grimace though she tries, turning her head away. She knows she’s caught when Cat chuckles. “I never really saw the appeal.” She shrugs and drifts closer to the balcony, crossing her arms over her chest. “Balls and strikes and runs, but they all seem to stand around an awful lot.”

She shrugs again and her feet touch down, closer than Cat expects. Neither woman backs away.

Cat lifts her drink to her lips and takes a sip, relishing the smoky flavor. She swallows heavily and goes for broke. “Sports more exciting on Krypton, hm?”

It’s a risk, she knows, to ask such a direct question. Kara has shared very little about her home planet, less so when asked rather than offering the information herself, and for a moment Cat thinks Kara won’t answer.

But then, Kara scrunches up her nose to hide a smile. The change that comes over her warms something deep in Cat’s heart.

“We didn’t have sports, not like on Earth,” Kara starts, crossing her arms over her chest and tilting her head back, face upturned like the words she’s searching for might appear in the clouds.

“I mean, the Military Guild had activities sometimes, but that was….” She shrugs. “Nothing this organized.”

Kara pauses, mulling her words, and then her lips quirk and this time she lets the smile break free. “It amazes me sometimes how many different cultures there are on Earth, how alike and how different they are all across the planet, even for something like a sport.” She lowers her head and blue eyes snag Cat’s. There’s something wistful there and Cat finds herself aching just to smooth a fingertip over the other woman’s brow.

Kara blinks as if coming back to herself and huffs out a little laugh, looking away shyly. “What about you? Not using your box seats tonight?”

Kara realizes her mistake as soon as the words are out of her mouth, lips curling over her teeth and eyes going wide, but Cat chooses not to point it out. They both know that while Kara knows all about her box seats, Supergirl shouldn’t.

Once upon a time, Cat would’ve pounced on the slip-up, but it’s been a long year and they’ve both gone through things that not so long ago, Cat wouldn’t have thought possible. They even saved the world together just two short months ago. So now she just sidles closer, passing Kara to rest her elbows against the balustrade and trying to ignore the way her heart pounds at the attractive flush on Kara’s cheeks.

Kara turns with her, pressing close and mimicking her pose. Cat can feel her body heat against her arm.

Close enough to touch.

When she answers, Cat can’t mask the breathlessness of her voice. “No, not tonight. It isn’t as fun to go alone.” Carter is spending the first two weeks of summer break with his father, first in Metropolis to visit a cousin, then to London.

But Kara already knows that.

“Perhaps…” Cat reaches out, just a finger, her pinky brushing against Kara’s wrist. Kara’s breath hitches.

“Perhaps what?”

Cat blinks at the horizon, takes another swallow of scotch. “Mm, I was just thinking, perhaps next time the Nighthawks have a home game, it would be nice to have company.”

“Oh,” Kara whispers, breathless.

“I could teach you the… _intricacies_ of America’s past-time.”

A laugh, throaty and surprised, bursts from Kara’s mouth in a breath. She’s nodding before Cat has a chance to take offense at the reaction. “I’d like that.”

Cat smiles wide, flashing white teeth, but tempers it quickly.

Kara turns to her, brow furrowed but eyes hopeful. “Cat…”

Something in the distance seems to catch Kara’s attention, eyes going sharp and focused beyond Cat’s shoulder. Her posture shifts, standing suddenly taller, shoulders back. Her hands fall away from the balustrade and Cat misses her warmth instantly.

Kara’s frown deepens and her mouth parts, but then just as suddenly, she blinks and shakes her head and turns back to Cat, slightly embarrassed smile quirking her lips.

“Everything alright?”

Cat wonders how far Kara can actually see, what seems plain as day to her that a human would struggle to even locate.

Kara nods jerkily, hands in fists at her sides again and Cat steps back until she feels the sofa behind her, knowing what’s coming. “Yeah, uh, yeah. I just…. There’s something I should check out. Just to be safe.”

Disappointment flares across Cat’s chest, but she acquiesces with a nod and a gesture to the sky, drink sloshing in its glass. She tries to keep her voice even. “By all means, Supergirl, don’t let me stop you.”

Kara’s answering smile is relieved but tight, and it doesn’t reach her eyes. Cat frowns, mouth opening to ask what’s wrong, what she saw, but Kara is already in the sky, hurtling across the city. The blowback rocks Cat on her feet and she steadies herself with a hand on the sofa arm.

Cat murmurs a warning, “be careful,” to the retreating speck, squinting into the sun just as she was five minutes before.

There’s something there, away in the distance, a soft flash in the clouds that’s gone before it’s really there and could entirely be in Cat’s imagination. But that niggling feeling of a hunch is back, prickling the back of her neck and making it hard to swallow. She grimaces as she downs the rest of her scotch and pulls out her phone, scrolling her contacts until she finds the name of CatCo’s chief meteorologist.

She really does hate a slow news day.

***

“Alex?”

Kara’s earpiece crackles to life and the crowd cheers, loud and obtrusive. “ _I’m here, Supergirl.”_ She sounds out of breath.

“Do we have anyone at the DEO keeping an eye on tonight’s meteor shower?”

“ _Vasquez is on satellite duty, she’ll see if anything’s up. Why?”_

Kara hesitates, circling the stadium twice before she even realizes that’s where she’s ended up. The crowd is cheering _for her_ and she moves on, out of sight, watching the skyline.

“I dunno, I’ve just got a feeling about it.” A hunch. She tries not to think of Cat, tries not to let that infinitesimal touch and the hope of something more blooming in her chest distract her.

“ _Your spidey-sense is tingling?”_

“Something like that, Winn.” She needs to get higher. “Alex, can you contact Vasquez, let her know I’m gonna go up and take a look.”

_“Kara…”_

”It’s fine, Alex, I’m just going to take a look.”

She knows what her sister is thinking about, isn’t thrilled with going higher up in the atmosphere than usual either, but she knows it’s the best way to see for herself if this feeling is warranted. At least until Vasquez has a clear image on satellite if this is something they actually need to worry about.

“ _Okay, let me know what you find.”_

“I will.”

***

“Vasquez?”

“Satellite imagery is normal, ma’am.”

“Can you see the meteors? Are any of them, like, _really_ meteory?”

There’s a pause and Kara thinks for a moment that comms have dropped out.

“…meteory, ma’am?”

“Ugh, you know what I mean, Vasquez.”

“I understand.” Kara can hear her smirk and doesn’t appreciate it. “Nothing out of the ordinary, ma’am. Imagery from our weather satellites and the reports from the National City Observatory match NOAA’s predictions: A few larger pieces of debris than what we’d see during the Perseids or the Geminids but it should all burn up in the atmosphere.”

There’s another pause, Vasquez tapping constantly at her computer keyboard. “Should be a pretty spectacular show if the clouds break.”

Kara sighs. It’s what she wanted to hear. “Thanks, Vasquez.” She’s already moving up, up above the cloud cover, up into thinner and thinner air, barely hears the reply.

“Anytime, ma’am.”

***

The game ends at 10:42pm after going into extra innings, and all hell breaks loose. It’s civil at first, mostly, just drunk fans flooding the streets after a tense match on a hot night. Metropolis fans say National City threw the first punch. Nighthawks fans say it was the other way around.

Either way, the streets around the stadium are in chaos, no matter who started it.

_“Who the hell sets a cop car on fire?!”_

Winn really doesn’t need to yell: Alex’s nerves are already fried and the riots are barely getting started.

“An idiot, that’s who,” she grumbles, shoving said idiot by the shoulders toward the waiting NCPD van. The receiving cop looks nervously between his partner and Alex. She doesn’t have time for this.

“Can I help you, Officer?” He’s a sergeant, she can see that from the bars on his uniform sleeve, but he’s acting like a probie fresh out of the Academy and she can’t find it in herself to care much about honorifics.

“Um, we were just wondering, um.” His partner shoves at him and he finds his voice. “Has Supergirl been called?”

Alex grinds her teeth and levels him with a look. She wishes she could just say “duh” and be done with it, but before she can come up with an adequately scathing response, the sky lights up like the Fourth of July.

The clouds glow brilliant white, drawing everyone’s gaze up like a beacon. Alex can see dark silhouettes moving toward the earth with startling speed and she’s yelling before she’s even thought of a plan, moving the cops and the idiot and the drunks on Townsend Street back, back, back before whatever is up there reaches them.

A familiar _whoosh_ pushes in her ears and then her sister is hurtling past them, punching up into the first dark shape she can reach. It breaks around Kara’s’ fist, shattering with a bang that leaves Alex’s ears ringing and pieces of rock skittering and bouncing across the asphalt.

“Get everyone out of here!” Kara roars and then she’s back in the air, catching the next dark shape and hurling it back the way it came before using her heat vision to explode the next one.

“Go, go.” Alex distantly realizes she’s pushing the sergeant into a run. Her breath is seizing in her throat. “We need to evacuate the city.”

She taps her earpiece. “Agent Schott! Get your team and get the hell out of here, now!”

All she gets in response is a crackling whine.

***

The noise of the crowd echoes up the sides of buildings from blocks away. James can’t tell if their chants are out of anger or elation, but they’re heading his way.

He lives close enough to the Nighthawks’ stadium that he can hear the games from his apartment with the windows open. If he tunes into AM radio at the right time, it’s almost like he’s right there in the stands, listening to the announcers give the play-by-play through tinny speakers and hearing every crack of the bat, every cheer or jeer from the fans. It’s better than season tickets.

Tonight he climbs out onto his fire escape with his camera in hand, planting his feet on the rungs of the ladder and shoving his body against the stucco, angling for the perfect view of the street.

Actual sports photography is Lance’s forte, but maybe James can get a few shots of the impromptu parade filling the streets below. He hopes the street lights bouncing off the cloud cover can give him enough light to shoot.

Just as the first wave of ‘Hawks fans make their way onto Juniper Avenue, something taps James’ right shoulder and then clatters down the fire escape, pinging off the metal to the ground.

He barely spares it a glance, figures a neighbor above him is trying to get the same look at the growing maelstrom below.

He focuses the lens on his camera.

Another something whines past his ear, too big and too loud to be a mosquito. This one hits the base of the fire escape, right next to where James’ left knee is wedged awkwardly to hold his balance. His leg feels hot and he looks down, watches in shock and something like horror as white-hot rock melts through the metal and singes his pants on its way down. He doesn’t have time to think about it before the sky lights up white and blinding and rocks the size of his head and bigger rain down from above the cloud cover.

In a rush he’s on his feet, scrambling to get back inside. His phone rings somewhere inside his apartment, but once the roof is over his head again, he can’t tear his eyes away from what he’s seeing outside his window.

A building three or four blocks over erupts in a shower of brick and mortar and then a dark blue blur is streaking into the sky.

James raises his camera as the sky lights up once more, this time Supergirl’s heat vision arcing across the clouds. The meteor she aims for bursts into pebbles and dust.

James breathes a little easier but doesn’t put his camera down.

More meteors break through the clouds.

***

“Supergirl!”

Rock explodes too close to Kara’s head, pushing her down and back, ears ringing.

She recovers quickly, flies up again.

A dark figure levels off next to her, cape whipping in the air behind him. She’s at once startled and relieved to see J’onn next to her in his Martian form.

Another meteor hurtles toward them, burning hot but not burning away in the atmosphere. J’onn flies forward before Kara can stop him. He catches the meteor easily enough but the force of its trajectory pushes him back in the blink of an eye.

“J’onn, let it go!” Her voice is hoarse and she swallows back grit. Thankfully he does what she says, and one blast of heat vision makes quick work of the rock.

“What can I do to help?” J’onn’s voice is nearly swallowed by the rushing wind and the sounds of screams from the streets below.

“Help them,” she pleads. Panic lodged itself in her throat when the first meteor she missed crashed into a parking garage. She can’t help everyone, not by herself.

“Clear the streets, clear the buildings. I’ve got this!”

Rao, she hopes she does.

J’onn retreats back to ground before the next wave of rocks breaks the atmosphere.

***

The stadium is a smoldering mess by eleven-thirty.

In the end, no one remembers the score, or even who won the game.

The larger meteors come at intervals, not anything predictable but it gives the DEO, the NCPD, the fire department, the Mayor’s office enough time to get the warning out and start evacuating the areas of the city in the direct path of the meteor shower. The power goes out sometime after midnight and the governor declares a state of emergency.

The National Guard sets up triage an hour south of city limits. Alex finds Winn there around three in the morning, concussed with singed clothes and a broken leg, but otherwise okay. She tries to reach Kara, commandeers the National Guard’s radio frequencies, but Supergirl stays airborne.

Without the usual light pollution, her heat vision can be seen from miles away, a beacon and a warning all at once.

***

Kara is magnificent. It’s the only word that fits, really. She’s everywhere at once. She catches smaller meteors bare-handed and lets then drop harmlessly to the rooftops of skyscrapers, she uses her freeze breath to slow them down and her heat vision to break them apart, and Cat can’t stop watching her.

She shouldn’t be here. She should’ve evacuated with the last of her team, but Cat is nothing if not devoted. To her company, to her people, to getting the story out and getting to the heart of the matter, no matter what. Even without a full news team, a natural disaster of this magnitude must be covered, and if that means Cat uploads the last images to Twitter herself before cell service cuts out, so be it.

And then she watches through the windows of the bullpen as Kara circles the city with grim determination, eyes ever-skyward. Even from a distance, Cat can see the exhaustion lining Kara’s face, the tight way she holds her body as she soars higher and higher.

Cat loses sight of her not long after the meteors stop falling and paces the newsroom restlessly, counting the minutes by the lightening of the sky.

She jams her forefinger against her phone’s screen every now and then in the vain hope that the no doubt overloaded cell towers will take pity on her and give her just a smidge of a signal so she can call her sons. She knows she could leave, but even stepping onto a balcony and listening to the chaos of the streets below fills her with leaden panic.

So she stays, watching her phone and the ever-brightening sky, waiting for any kind of sign that this ordeal is over.

***

The CatCo building is somehow still standing at sunrise. It’s taken a beating and Kara hopes everyone got out okay, not just for the meteors, but because she’s aiming for it now and she can feel her powers seeping away the longer she stays in the air.

The meteors stopped falling around four o’clock but Kara stayed aloft, flying into the upper reaches of the atmosphere in ever-widening circles to make sure there were no more. She stopped to check in with the military triage center once, just to see for herself that Alex and Winn and J’onn were okay, to switch out her comms device, and then she was back in the air to stop another dozen space rocks from smashing into the city.

By the time the sun starts to peek over the horizon, Kara is exhausted. Sweat pools slick and uncomfortable inside her suit and her cape feels heavier every passing second. She pushes herself, just one more time, one burst of speed, and then she’s powered only by her forward momentum, hoping it’s enough to keep gravity at bay just a little while longer.

Curling into a ball, she turns midair and her back hits the building in an explosion of glass. Pain radiates across her arms and down to her toes before she skids across the floor and lands in a heap.

Finally, she can rest.

***

“Alex, you’re gonna wanna see this!” Winn’s voice is laced with panic and Alex only feels marginally guilty walking away from a conversation with J’onn and an Army captain mid-sentence.

Winn is already turning his laptop towards her by the time she asks “what is it?” and it takes her a moment to comprehend the graphs on his screen. “Are those Kara’s biometrics and… what are these numbers?” She recognizes them but they don’t make sense.

“GPS coordinates.”

Alex shakes her head. “Winn, that’s the--”

“CatCo building, I know.” Alex leans closer to the screen. Winn grimaces and adjusts his position, trying not to jostle his leg. “Alex, I think she crash-landed.”

“Shit.” Alex is gone from his side as quick as she came, and Winn watches her run back to J’onn, cranes his neck to watch them take off into the morning haze.

***

Hands, warm and soft, press on Kara’s cheeks.

“Kara?” A familiar voice coaxes her awake.

She must be dreaming. There’s no way…. CatCo should be empty by now, she checked and—

“Kara? Can you hear me?” The hands on her cheeks move to brush the hair out of her eyes; she winces in pain as they catch on split skin. Maybe she should’ve double-checked before her x-ray vision crapped out.

She tries to open her eyes; sees familiar green eyes, pinched in concern, staring back at her, blonde hair haloed by the rising sun.

“…Cat?”

Kara struggles to keep her eyes open, struggles to sit up. She might have a broken rib or two. Her words slur in her mouth. “Cat, what are you doing here?” None of this makes sense.

She lays back down and takes a breath, then another, and Cat’s hands keep smoothing back her hair. Salt splashes down across her chin and she barely registers that Cat is crying before the world goes dark again.

***

“Stay with me, Kara, stay with me.” She doesn’t know how long she’s been sitting here, knees aching and heels fallen off somewhere behind her. She thinks distantly that she’ll have to be careful of the glass when she gets up again. Kara’s eyes flutter but stay closed.

But she’s already decided, somewhere in the back of her mind, that she isn’t getting up until Kara does.

She’s known that Kryptonians can bleed. She’s known they can be hurt since the first time Lex Luthor beat Superman in Metropolis. But her mind is on a loop of a tiny cut on a finger, one that barely needed a band-aid, and the look of fear and wonder on Kara’s face at the blood trailing down her own hand.

Cat felt protective of Kara then and that feeling returns ten-fold now. Not that it ever really went away.

There’s a familiar _whoosh_ of air behind her but Cat doesn’t turn, doesn’t stop the soothing motion of her hand over Kara’s hair, even as it comes away sticky with blood. Tiny cuts and scrapes litter the exposed skin of Kara’s face and hands, her tights in ruins from the glass surrounding them on the floor. Boots crunch in it, and still Cat doesn’t turn until there are hands on her shoulders, gently pulling her back, and someone rushing past her to cradle Kara in their arms.

“Miss Grant, are you alright?” Cat recognizes the deep baritone of Kara’s Martian government agent friend and she lets herself be pulled. Kara’s sister is close to hysterical on the floor.

Cat doesn’t respond, feels her tongue thick in her throat, her eyes glued to Kara’s still form. The sister—Alex, she remembers, Alex presses her cheek against Kara’s chest. The room feels stifling despite the steady breeze coming through the destroyed floor-to-ceiling window, ruffling Cat’s hair and scattering the smaller bits of glass across the floor. On any other day, Cat would deflect the heaviness in the air with a flip comment, but with tears drying on her cheeks and a superhero broken and unmoving on her floor, she can only watch, and hope.

Nonsensical words fall from Alex’s mouth now and the Martian lets go of Cat’s shoulders, moves like he might join the sisters on the floor. But suddenly Kara groans and rolls to her side, spitting blood and grit from her mouth. Cat finally feels like she can breathe again when a voice, rough and barely audible, grunts out “Alex, I’m okay.”

“Oh, thank God.” Cat makes eye contact with Alex for the first time at their simultaneous exclamation. Both look away just as quickly.

The sisters murmur reassurances to each other and Cat feels suddenly out of place. She tries her phone again, just for something to do with her hands. The urge to pace the room instead of watching Supergirl need help just to sit up is overwhelming, but she’s still barefoot and there is still glass covering the floor.

She glances at the Martian, who stands to the side with his arms crossed, watching Alex and Kara with something like fatherly concern. He doesn’t move either, though the look on his face tells Cat he wants to, just as much as she does, and then she can’t stand the atmosphere anymore.

“I don’t suppose you have a way to get all of us out of here, hmm?”

He startles a little at her question, blinking and stammering, but it’s the sister who answers.

“A Blackhawk should already be on the roof.” Alex’s voice is clipped, authoritative. “You’re welcome to ride with us out of the city, but getting Kara back to base is our top priority.”

Cat scoffs, ready to reply but Kara beats her to it.

“Alex, no, I’m fine.”

“Like hell you are.”

If the circumstances weren’t so dire, it would almost be entertaining to witness the two sisters stare each other down. But then Kara shifts again, wincing in pain and struggling to stand on her own, and the reality of the situation crashes back down. Kara has to brace her hand against Alex’s shoulder and catch her breath, but when she speaks again her voice is steady.

“I know, Alex, I _know_ I’m not _fine._ ” She pauses, glances past Alex to lock eyes with Cat, an unreadable expression in stormy blue eyes. She almost looks apologetic and Cat finds herself drifting forward a step or two. Kara looks back to her sister. “My powers are blown and I think…” She drifts off, looking down at her arm where it hugs her midsection. She shakes her head. “Never mind. The point is, I don’t need to go to the DEO. I just need to rest for a while.”

It doesn’t take much, just a gentle flicker of her eyes, for Cat to know without a shadow of a doubt where Kara would prefer to rest. Or rather, with whom. Her body flushes at the very thought.

The Martian clears his throat and shifts a little next to Cat, crossing and re-crossing his arms.

Alex isn’t having it, though. “Yeah, you can rest in the med bay, with the sun lamps.” The last part is said under her breath, as if she hopes Cat won’t hear her from four feet away. Cat files that information away but her focus remains on Kara, who’s shaking her head.

“No, Alex, please. You’re going to need all hands on deck to put the city back together. Until I have my powers back, I’m useless for that.”

A thought occurs to Cat as the sun rises higher in the sky, glinting off the glass like water on sand. It’s a ridiculous thought, one she knows, judging by the fierce glint in Alex’s eyes, will get shot down if she even dares voice it. But the Martian is looking at her fully now, curious but calm, and she feels compelled to say it out loud any way. “She can come with me. There’s plenty of sun at my beach house, and we might be far enough from the city to actually get cell service back.”

Alex turns, jaw tight and eyes narrowed. Cat allows the appraisal; Alex is considering the offer, at least, instead of turning it down out of hand.

As if on cue, the Martian’s and then Alex’s phones ring, loud and intrusive in the otherwise quiet newsroom. The Martian gets to his first, just as Kara pulls her own phone out of her suit, mouth scrunched in confusion until she pulls it free and sees the way the plastic is bent in half and the glass in the screen tumbles to the floor.

Cat only just hears a few “yes of courses” and “right away, General” to get the gist of the Martian’s side of the conversation before he hangs up, and then suddenly the room is in motion.

“Alex, let’s go. We need to be on hand to coordinate our resources with the National Guard before the Army Reserves arrive.”

“What? No, J’onn, I’m not leaving Kara--”

“Alex, I’ll be fine.”

J’onn just puts his hand up, silencing them both. Cat can’t help but be impressed by his command. “We can’t wait, Alex. Kara will be fine with Cat.” Alex’s eyes snap to his, filled with fury and surprise. He simply shakes his head. “It’s alright, she already knows.” He rests his hand on her shoulder. “You can rendezvous with her once things are more settled here.”

Alex looks ready to protest again, hands already gesturing to Kara’s ruined phone, and Cat makes a snap decision. She steps forward and takes Alex’s phone from her hand, only half-surprised that she doesn’t use a screen lock.

She taps at the screen and hands it back in a hurry. "That's my personal cell. Feel honored to have it."

Dark brown eyes blaze gold in the rising sun, but Alex keeps her jaw clenched tight. She secures her phone in a side pocket and turns, pulling Kara in a brief but fierce hug before allowing J’onn to take her arm.

Cat tries and fails and tries again to blink the surprise out of her eyes as the man changes form right in front of her. Even his voice is different, deeper, yet soothing, as he calls back, “we’ll see you soon,” and takes off out the window, cape billowing behind them.

“Wow…”

She hears a soft laugh behind her and then glass crunching under boots. A warm arm grasps her elbow and then Kara’s voice tickles the back of her ear. “You never seem that impressed when I do that.”

Cat can’t help but laugh as she turns back to face the other woman. “Oh, well, you know… I’ve never seen you grow a foot and turn green, so.”

Cat takes a moment to truly take in Kara’s appearance, can’t help but reach up and smooth a finger over a cut above Kara’s eyebrow. She looks exhausted, her face pale in the early light, bags Cat didn’t know could exist forming under Kara’s eyes.

“Well, Supergirl,” she murmurs, “up, up and away.”

***

It takes an ungodly amount of effort to make it first to the stairwell and then up to the roof to board the Blackhawk Alex promised them. The view of the city from the helicopter, though, isn’t one Cat will soon forget.

Kara sits beside her, unmoving, jaw clenched and eyes closed in pain. Her face twists with every pocket of air the helicopter hits. Cat is glad that Kara isn’t seeing their city like this. Not now, not yet.

As soon as her powers are back, Cat knows Kara will be right back here, helping to pick up the pieces.

Cat will too, in her way. She’s already mentally planning at least six lead stories on relief and recovery efforts and a scathing editorial on the lack of warning and shoddy predictive models from officials ahead of the meteor shower.

But for now, while a huge swath of National City is without power or cell service, she’ll let the regional affiliate stations that are still working at full power cover the disaster. For now, while her son is thankfully on the other side of the country with his father, she’ll get herself out of harm’s way.

And she’ll let Supergirl rest.

***

It’s embarrassing, needing as much help as she does.

She needed help getting up the stairs to the roof of the CatCo building. She needed help getting on and off the helicopter. She needed help buckling her harness. And now, standing in Cat’s immaculate bathroom in her massive beach house, Kara discovers that she needs help just getting out of her supersuit to get in the shower.

She considers just showering in it, but the cape is starting to get too heavy and she knows that will only get worse if it’s soaking wet. She tries one more time to reach up to unclasp it, her breath escaping in a pained gasp, before she resigns herself to a decision she probably should’ve made ten minutes ago.

There’s a panicky aftertaste in the back of her throat when she cracks the door open. The last thing she wants to do is ask for help, again, especially feeling as weak as she does now, ribs aching with every breath, but she hasn’t made any progress by herself.

“…Cat?” Her voice croaks around the lump in her throat and she sucks in air, trying and failing to take a full breath. She clears her throat and winces at the way it jostles her ribs and she swallows, hard. Tries again.

“Cat?” she calls, the force behind the word echoing down the hall. Kara has no idea where Cat is in the house, how far sound travels in it, whether she’ll have to swallow even more pride and go looking for the other woman.

Just as Kara is preparing to call out again, fingers gripping the doorjamb to get control of her nerves and her heart pounding in her chest, the woman in question rounds the end of the hall, apprehension etched in her features.

“Kara? Is everything alright?” Kara can’t remember a time she’s ever heard such concern in Cat’s voice and it makes her ache in a way that has nothing to do with her injuries.

“Yeah, um.”

She moves away from the bathroom door as Cat approaches, watches the way she breezes down the hall in a silk camisole and loose-fitting linen pants. Cat slows and Kara closes her eyes, tilting her head back and willing away embarrassed tears. A hand, warm, soft, familiar, covers hers where it still grips the doorjamb, thumb soothing over her knuckles.

“What’s wrong, darling?”

Kara’s cheeks flush at the endearment but she doesn’t open her eyes. “I-I… I need help.” She licks her lips. “I can’t get the suit off by myself.”

Cat’s thumb stills. “Oh.” She pats Kara’s hand, a nervous little motion that Kara’s seen a thousand times. “Oh, that’s… well.”

Kara tries not to be so obvious blinking back her tears, sucking down the utter frustration of feeling so helpless.

But then Cat’s hand stills again and squeezes Kara’s fingers.

“Well, Supergirl,” Cat whispers, her voice thick but the words clipped, precise, “what goes first, hm? The cape, I assume?”

A laugh bursts past Kara’s lips. She can’t quite meet Cat’s eyes but she directs her with words and gestures how to release the cape, how to reach the zippers and clasps of the bodice. Cat’s hands are methodical but gentle as she undresses Kara. She doesn’t say a word that isn’t a question of how or where until the suit finally falls away and Kara is standing in her bra and underwear.

“Oh, Kara….” Cat reaches out a careful hand, brows pinched in concern and eyes glistening.

Her fingertips graze the black and purple bruise blossoming around Kara’s side. Kara catches her hand before it can touch her fully, presses it to the flat of her chest instead.

Her heart is pounding and she hopes Cat can feel it.

“I’ll be alright, Cat. I just need some sun.”

Cat’s stormy eyes catch hers. Her jaw clenches before she pushes against Kara’s chest, moving her back toward the waiting shower. Her mouth opens to speak, but nothing comes out. She shakes her head, tries again. “If the way your sister reacted is any indication, you’re going to need a lot more than a tanning session for _that_ ,” she gestures at Kara’s ribs, “to heal without your powers.”

Kara doesn’t say anything, just lets herself be turned. Cat’s hands are like brands on the bare skin of her back and she feels the touch over her entire body. She braces herself against the closed shower door and sucks in as deep a breath as she can manage. Cat’s forehead presses against her back, between her hands, and Kara’s knees buckle when she feels lips press against her spine.

“Cat…”

“One more layer, Supergirl, and then you can clean up all of these cuts and bruises.”

Cat’s voice is its own kind of soothing. Kara’s body has felt like one big walking bruise since she landed inside the CatCo newsroom, but suddenly there’s a different kind of throb focused between her legs and it’s all she can do to keep herself upright.

Cat’s hands slide under the edge of the sports bra, pushing up, and Kara grits her teeth at the motion of having to lift her arms above her head. Pleasure and pain mingle into a confusing blend of sensation. The bra slaps quietly on the floor where it lands and Cat’s hands settle on Kara’s shoulders.

The air around them is suddenly stifling with a kind of tension Kara’s never felt before. She wants to press back into Cat’s embrace, she wants to drag Cat into the shower with her and worship her from head to toe, she wants to bury her face in Cat’s neck and just breathe, just breathe for the first time in what feels like days. Soft lips press wet kisses against Kara’s back, forcing a whimper from Kara’s throat. If she had her powers, she knows she’d have no control over her strength and there would be more broken glass around them from the shower door.

The soft fabric of Cat’s loose clothing shifts against her bare skin and Kara’s resolve finally shatters. She turns, carefully, painfully, but she turns and finds those warm lips with her own, relishes in the gasp her kiss elicits from Cat. Her body bows, thigh slipping between Cat’s legs and arms cradling her close. A warm, eager tongue licks up past her teeth and Kara moans, presses closer still. As her hands drift down, over soft silk covering the warm skin of Cat’s back, Cat’s hands move up into Kara’s hair, fingers combing tresses back away from her ears and gripping at the nape of her neck in equal measure. Pain, sharp and unwelcome, springs from a cut behind her ear and Kara breaks from the kiss with a gasp.

“Oh, I’m—are you alright? I shouldn’t’ve—” Cat’s hands flutter over Kara’s shoulders, eyes searching in apology.

“Shh, I’m okay,” Kara soothes, emboldened now to lean in and steal a softer kiss, just a press of her lips against Cat’s.

Cat still shakes her head. “I’m… I’m sorry, Kara. I shouldn’t have kissed you like that, I—”

A finger to her lips stops the rest of her sentence.

“Why not?”

The question slips out, voice tremulous. It’s not what Kara intended to say and certainly not how she intended it to sound, so meek and worried and breathless. But it has the intended effect. Cat frowns, mulling the question over before responding with a startled, “what?”

Kara takes a breath, feels a twinge in her ribs but ignores it for the pounding of her heart and the sure grip of her hands still holding onto Cat’s waist. Blue eyes capture hazel-green and Kara smiles, just a lopsided quirk of her lips. “Why shouldn’t you have kissed me like that?”

Mouth opening and closing around a response, Cat puts her hands back on Kara’s bare shoulders, first looking back into her eyes and then anywhere but, until she seems to realize that Kara is still mostly naked. A blush as pretty as Kara has ever seen creeps up Cat’s neck to paint her cheeks.

“Kara…” Cat clucks her tongue, rolling her eyes before they rest on Kara’s collarbone. “I don’t think this is the kind of rest and recovery your sister had in mind.”

“I really don’t want to be thinking about my sister right now,” Kara scoffs. She takes in the nervous way Cat chews at her bottom lip, the way her eyes dart around. She steps forward, closer in to Cat’s space, looks herself up and down when she finally gains Cat’s attention. “Do you?”

Cat’s answering smile is almost demure. Her right hand taps against Kara’s shoulder once, twice and then drifts down to press flat against Kara’s chest, pinky brushing against the soft swell of a breast. Kara follows Cat’s gaze down between their bodies, fingertips buzzing with nervous energy the longer Cat stays silent. Finally, Cat shakes her head and presses a gentle kiss, barely more than a promise, to the corner of Kara’s mouth. “Take a shower, Kara.” Her voice is a low hum, but her words are firm. “Take a shower and wash last night away. Meet me out on the deck and I’ll have some food ready for you.”

With a slow nod and one more kiss, Kara releases her hold on Cat, watches her step out of the room with a promise to bring in some clean clothes. She steps out of her underwear with only a minimal struggle and steps into the shower, turning the water on as hot as her over-taxed body can handle. It isn’t until she’s scrubbed the sweat and dust and grime from her body and rinsed the caked, dried blood from her hair that she dares touch her lips with her fingertips, and then she’s not sure she’ll ever stop smiling.

***

The sun is high over the deck when Kara finally makes her way outside. Waves crash against the cliff below the house, but the breeze is soft and warm. Cat marvels at the way Kara practically glows in the sun’s rays.

She also marvels at the amount of skin on display and smirks to herself for a job well-done.

As soon as she’d heard the water running, she’d come back into the bathroom and set clean clothing on the sink for Kara. If that clothing was a tank-top and a pair of shorts she knew would be too small on the other woman’s frame, well, she _is_ only human. The way Kara practically struts—as much as she can anyway, still cradling her side and stepping a bit gingerly—across the deck to the lounge chairs where Cat sits under a patio umbrella is all the proof Cat needs that they’re still on the same page about things. And she hopes those things involve all of the taut muscle currently coming toward her.

The shower did Kara some good, washing away the worst of the blood and grime, but it’s the sun that restores color in Kara’s cheeks and brightens her eyes. As Kara settles onto the lounger beside her, stretching long limbs in the direct light of the sun, Cat wonders how long it will take this time for her powers to come back, what spark she’ll need to come back to full strength. Whatever she can do to help, Cat is ready.

She has a thousand questions, probably more, about Kara’s relationship to the sun, how her powers work or don’t, things that Lois Lane has never published about Superman and that Supergirl refuses to publicly divulge. But Cat realizes she doesn’t want to ask them, not now. She only wants to bear witness to the way the sun restores the superhero lying next to her, and revel in the fact that she’s alive at all after last night, after Myriad and everything else this year has thrown at her.

“You should eat, too, you know.”

Cat hasn’t taken her eyes off the other woman since she walked outside, and yet in the midst of her reverie she’s somehow missed the fact that Kara is now stuffing her face with the sliced fruits, gourmet cheeses, and crackers Cat had prepared while she showered.

“I’m guessing you didn’t evacuate CatCo and then sneak back in before my crash-landing,” she’s saying around a mouthful of grapes, “which means you haven’t eaten since dinner last night.”

Kara points a strawberry slice in Cat’s direction, smiling in a way that shouldn’t be attractive with her cheeks full to the brim. But her blue eyes crinkle with mirth and her mouth curls just so and suddenly Cat can’t help but lean forward and press her lips to one full cheek. There’s a dip there, an old scar just below her eye that Kara’s glasses usually conceal, and Cat lets her nose graze across it now.

It’s easy here, to take what’s on offer without worrying about what happens next, what spin they’ll have to create for the rest of the world if this bliss moves beyond the boundaries of Cat’s beach house. It’s easy to brush her fingertips over the rapidly-healing cut above Kara’s eyebrow, to watch in wonder as the sun works magic on the other woman’s wounds.

It’s easy to lean in and kiss Kara whenever she likes, to let herself be fed strawberries and brie on crackers by sure hands that linger just a little too long at her lips. It’s easy to lose herself in blue eyes and soft smiles, and the thoughts that are normally there, telling her she’s too old, too bitter, too jaded, are quiet.

Cat’s phone buzzes on the table somewhere behind them, just out of reach. She knows she should answer it, just in case, but she’s made the most important calls to Carter and Adam already. The rest of the world can wait, just a little while longer.

The sound, though, seems to sober Kara. She brushes crumbs from her hands and lap, moving the tray of food to the floor with a sigh. She leans her head back against the cushion and turns toward Cat, not fully facing her, not quite making eye contact. Like whatever is on her mind is too much to bear all the way.

Taking pity on her, Cat decides to be the first to burst their bubble. “Your sister has already called me twice to check up on you. I’m regretting giving her my number.” Kara snorts, and Cat is pleased her words have had their intended effect. “And I thought _I_ was over-bearing with Carter.”

“She just worries.”

Cat just hums in response, but Kara sighs again. Reaching over to tangle their fingers together, Cat makes sure they’re connected before she pries, just a little bit. “What’s on your mind, dear?” Kara tries to shake her head, dismiss whatever is troubling her with a smile, but Cat presses. “I can feel your frown from here. What is it?”

Rolling her eyes, Kara turns on her side, releasing Cat’s hand to carefully prop herself up on her elbow. “It’s really nothing, just…”

“What have I told you about using self-diminishing language, hm?”

“To be direct and say what you mean the first time,” Kara replies automatically. She huffs out a laugh and shakes her head. “Okay, fine.”

Blue eyes snag Cat’s and she can’t help but swallow at the sudden dryness in her mouth at the intensity in them. She repeats her question. “What’s on your mind, Kara?”

Blushing a little at the use of her real name, Kara smiles. “I don’t want this,” she gestures between them, “to end, but I know it has to.” Emotion suddenly throbs in Cat’s throat. Kara must see her distress because she rushes to continue, “Not, like, forever, just… I can already feel my powers coming back. I’m healing.” She pulls up her shirt, showing off taut abdominal muscles and fading bruises over her ribs, no longer black but mostly yellow-green. “As soon as I’m able to, I have to go back, Cat.”

Cat reaches across the divide between their lounge chairs, hand brushing across Kara’s healing ribcage, pressing up between her breasts and against her sternum, feeling her heart beating steadily beneath muscle and bone. “Your city needs you.”

Kara nods.

“It needs me, too, if the number of calls I’ve missed is any indication.”

They smile at each other, but Cat doesn’t miss the weariness in Kara’s eyes. She leans forward, warm breath ghosting across Kara’s lips. “But they don’t get to have us yet.”

Kara closes the distance between them, her kiss as warm and solid as her arms wrapping around Cat. And Cat doesn’t fight their allure, allows herself to be pulled on top of Kara, never breaking the urgency of their kiss.

***

The headlines go something like this:

_Hope, heroics, and help: National City begins slow process of rebuilding after meteor strike_

_Supergirl swaps cape for construction helmet, helps National City rebuild after meteor strikes_

_CatCo CEO Cat Grant pledges foundation to aid rebuilding efforts in hardest-hit areas of National City following meteor strike_

_Girl of Steel becomes steelworker: Supergirl granted honorary union card for helping rebuild Nat’l City_

Several pages into the entertainment section, well beyond the human interest stories and government promises, below the headline detailing an upcoming celebrity telethon to raise money for recovery efforts, is a paragraph blurb in the gossip column:

_Cat Grant confirms relationship with former assistant_

The article is insubstantial at best, without a single attributable quote, and it’s mostly ignored in favor of the sheer volume of stories of the city coming together to rebuild itself.

If asked, Cat will roll her eyes and scoff, and Kara will blush and stammer. Neither will deny, however, that they each have a copy of the article saved somewhere, even years down the line.

_end._


End file.
